


Demons

by UglySandwich



Series: Arm's Length Apart Series [3]
Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, F/M, Fan Lore, Forbidden Love, Gemsonas - Freeform, Mild Smut, Romance, Trans Male Character
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-10
Updated: 2019-02-10
Packaged: 2019-10-25 21:44:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17733236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UglySandwich/pseuds/UglySandwich
Summary: The long awaited sequel to Always An Arm's Length Apart. Topaz is a lonely rebel who lives in the woods just outside Beach City. After Doc’s ship crashes near his home, one of the refugees, Halite, steals his heart. Will the spark they have turn in to a raging fire, or will their demons extinguish their love? Will Sapphire and Doc keep their relationship steady, or will their new freedom on Earth tear them apart?





	Demons

The initial landing wasn’t as smooth as Doc hoped. The ship was more for intergalactic travel, not for flying in planets with an atmosphere. She frantically mashed the buttons she thought would level the ship, but to no avail. The nose caught fire and they went plummeting down, down, down, into something greenish blueish blackish that she didn’t remember last time she was there. Was this new?

“We landed in the ocean. If we get out quick before the pressure in the cabin lowers, hopefully this thing won’t explode,” the red gem said a little frantically, looking for the button that opened the hatch.

Sapphire had other ideas, though. She wasted no time pulling out her claymore and stabbing a hole in the door. It was just wide enough to stick her fingers in, and with amazing strength, she pulled the hole a little further.

“Remind me to stay on your good side,” Doc mentioned as water suddenly flooded the cabin, quickly rising above their heads. Good thing they didn’t need to breathe.

Then they were free. The two of them held hands and swam to the surface, where a black substance coated them.

As they floated, Sapphire asked, “What is this? Why is the ocean suddenly black?”

“It’s called oil. Sometimes, humans are careless and oil gets into the ocean. It hurts the ecosystem,” she told her partner, wiping away the substance from her face before saying, “So we’re free, what should we do now?”

Sapphire caught her cleaning off her lips, and the message her lover was giving off was clear as day. “You can kiss me, if that’s what you’d like.”

They swam closer to kiss, holding each other close and bobbing with the waves.

Meanwhile, Halite was finally washing up on the shore. She laid in the warm sand, staring up at the clouds as shallow waves lapped at her body. Is this what freedom looked like? No satellites, no ships passing by, just the atmosphere around her? The calming aura of the planet seemed to curb her insanity. For the first time, she could think clearly.

 _This is my home now… I should build a place to rest,_ Halite thought _. Big palm leaves from that forest should work as a roof._

And as she went about collecting them, she stumbled across rusty metal, nuts and bolts all in disarray in the sand. She picked a handful up, then some more. And then she realized there was a trail. She kept picking up these odd, tiny and primitive looking things, following their path until she reached…

A ship? A _gem_ ship? Her entire body prickled with goosebumps at the sight of it. But it couldn’t have been sent for her, could it? After all, it was covered in Earth’s vegetation and patches of rust. It must have been empty.

Carefully, she prodded at the hand sensor by the door, making sure it was safe before placing her palm on it and opening the door. Halite wandered in then. Inside, she found tables of Era 1 contraptions. Some of them looked modded or fixed from a broken state. Someone was using them recently, she was sure of it. But who would even be in a place like this, with old tech like this?

And then she got her answer, in the form of something, no, someone, charging at her in the dark of the room. The entity pinned her against the floor, pressing a blade up against her throat.

“What are you doing in here?” a strange voice asked. It wasn’t anything like what she’d heard on Geopia. It was lower pitched, sort of gravelly.

Halite’s gem lit up, bathing the room in a dim white light. On top of her was… Another gem? She wasn’t sure. Gems aren’t made like this, not with chiseled faces or thin hips or broad shoulders. Tentatively, she reached up to touch the gem’s jaw and trace the harsh line with her palm.

The gem lowered her weapon. “You’re a gem?” she asked.

“You’re a gem? What kind of gem are you?”

“I’m a Topaz, duh. What are you? I’ve never seen a gem like you before.  Are you a Milky Quartz?”

“No. I’m a Halite. You’ve never heard of me?”

“Are you rare?”

“I’m the only one. I’m an accident. And I was asking what you were shapeshifting to imitate, because you don’t look much like a Topaz.”

Topaz flushed. “Oh! You’ve never seen a man before, have you? Well here on Earth, the humans mostly come in two body types, male and female. Gems by default are made to look like the female form. But I was never comfortable with my body, so I took this form permanently. I like it.”

“I like it too. It looks different.” Halite smoothed her palms down thick shoulders and buff arms, feeling him up through his orange camouflage coat.

“Oh that’s- that’s too close for comfort,” he said nervously, before finally getting off of her and reaching out a hand to help her up.

“So what is this place?” she asked. “Not the ship. I’ve seen these before. But where am I? What is this place called?”

“This is Earth. And right now we’re in Beach City, home to many humans and a few gems like us. So what brings you here?”

“Oh, that whole mess goes back a few centuries.”

* * *

 

_Rocks and dirt crumbled around Halite as she rose from her slumber and escaped her rocky birthplace. She stretched, then shook like a wet dog, trying to rid herself of the debris. “Whoo! Awesome! Now where’s the rest of my team?” She asked, looking around. The only thing nearby was a scanner, searching for off colors._

_“Ah! Perfect, a gem scanner! They’ll be able to tell me who I am. Maybe then I can catch up with the others.” She leapt in front of it, waving her arms. “Hello! It’s me! I’m a Milky Quartz, can you send a report back to my superior that I emerged?”_

_As soon as the scanner locked on to the gem on her hip, it blasted._

_Almost on instinct, she pulled an axe from her gem and used it to deflect the blow. “What?! You’re supposed to help me!”_

_As it was charging up another blast, she leapt towards it and swung her axe, and hit it right in the blaster. It exploded, throwing Halite into the wall of gem-shaped holes. She almost got up to run after she saw more coming, but her form started glitching._

_That’s when through the dust and rubble, two gems emerged. A tiny Diamond, and her Pearl. “Pink Sapphire was right! She’s here!”_

_“Pleh em, Mi dekcarc!”_

* * *

_Yellow paced up and down her throne room in front of Pink and Halite, rubbing her temples. “She has no squad, she’s eight thousand years late. She’s not even from your court, and she’s not even a Quartz! Why do you want to keep her?”_

_“My Sapphire said there was an off color emerging today. When I found her, she was cracked and there were a fleet of drones after her. I couldn’t just let her die! I could keep her as a personal companion, just like my Padparadscha and Rutiles. Please?” Pink pleaded. She used her puppy dog eyes and pouted, clasping her hands under her chin to show her fellow Diamond just how much she wanted her._

_“Alright, fine. Keep her, I couldn’t care less. Shoo! Get out, I need to work.”_

_As they ran out of Yellow’s room, Halite finally asked, “So if I’m not a quartz, what am I? What’s my purpose if I’m not a soldier?”_

_When the door closed behind them, Pink grabbed her by the shoulders. “Your purpose is to be yourself. We’ll have my pearl run some tests on your gem to find out what it is, but that doesn’t define you. Your experiences, who you care about, what you do- that defines you.”_

_And Halite was too starstruck to speak._

* * *

_“According to my tests, you are a… Huh. You’re not a gem at all,” Pearl said, raising an eyebrow. “It says here that you’re just a mass of salt. The injectors must have put the materials into a vein of salt by accident.”_

_Pink, lounging around on a chaise, covered in pebbles, giggled. “That’s so cool! You’re just a bigger version of them! So, what should we call you?”_

_Halite sat down and a group of pebbles raised the floor into a chair for her. “Yeesh, I’m never gonna get used to that. What about Halite?”_

_Pearl gaped. “The technical term for salt? You mean… You’re not even going to try to lie about it?”_

_“Why should I? Pink says it doesn’t define me.”_

* * *

 

 “…And when she was shattered, I guess I had nobody and nowhere to go. I hid with the other Off Colors, and sometimes I went up to the surface to find things to entertain us. One night, I was on the surface, planning to get myself shattered by crashing a ship into a concert. But I was hijacked by these other two gems, and they drove me here.”

Topaz took her face in his calloused hand, mimicking the gesture she’d done to him just hours before. “Well, I’m glad you lived. You’re not a mistake to me.”

Butterflies erupted somewhere in Topaz’ form, and she shuddered. “What is that?”

“What is what?”

“This feeling. Something is stirring.”

But before he could answer, they drifted closer until their lips almost touched.

“Maybe it’s meant to be,” Topaz said, before capturing her lips in a kiss.

 


End file.
